Poplar Forest is one of two personal residences that Thomas Jefferson designed for himself, the other being Monticello. Jefferson’s wife, Martha Wayles Skelton Jefferson, inherited the land--originally a 6,861-acre parcel--at her father’s death in 1773, but Jefferson did not begin construction on the house until 1806, and at his death in 1826, he was still working on his little "getaway." Despite its audacious design--it was the first documented octagonal residence in America--and the fact that it is one of the very few extant Jeffersonian structures, Poplar Forest is not nearly so...